Rocky Mountain Sabotage

More passengers began struggling to their feet, echoing the terrified thought.

“Hold it!” Kent’s authoritative voice sliced through the panic. “We are down safe, and we are not going to blow up. Stay in your seats. When it comes to evacuation, we’ll do it together. Let’s get our bearings first.”

The panicked rhino plunged to a stop, chest heaving.

“How do you know we’re not going to explode?” cried another passenger, voice high and tight.

“Simple. It takes fuel to fire an explosion. We don’t have any.”

Lauren bit her lower lip. That explained the necessity of a crash landing, but not what blew up and caused the fuel dump and the instrument/radio failure. That was something she wanted an answer for ASAP, but not while people were teetering on the verge of hysteria.

At the rear of the plane, a blistering tirade of profanity burst from one of the three Peerless One brokers. He was standing tall, holding his cell phone toward the ceiling, shaking it and cursing it.

“What seems to be the problem, sir?” Kent asked briskly.

“No cell service, that’s what.” The pit-bull-faced man scowled like a juicy steak had just been ripped from his jaws. “I was meeting with an important client tonight, and now I can’t let him know our incompetent pilot has crashed this tin can you call a plane. I’ll lose the account!”

“Get a grip, Dirk,” said one of the other Peerless One executives. “It’s amazing that we’re alive.”

Still scowling, the man named Dirk plopped back into his seat and silence fell, except for a few sniffles and groans.

Lauren gazed around Kent’s shoulders, searching for her mother. Anxious faces stared back at her above freshly rumpled three-piece suits. The elder statesman of the group was stirring and coming around to consciousness. But the spot where her mother had sat appeared to be empty. Of course, a seatback largely blocked her view.

Lauren’s heart sought to pump out of her chest. “Where’s my mother?”

Kent began moving up the aisle, nudging personal items under seats with his foot. “I’ll look for her. Not much room to go very far. Would you please check on my copilot?”

Lauren’s breath snagged. She’d forgotten about the critically injured woman. What kind of a physician’s assistant was she? Apparently, the kind that was a daughter first.

She stepped into the first set of seats, bent over the slumped woman and felt for a pulse. It was there, ragged and faint, but at least Mags was alive. Gently, Lauren lowered the seat back as far as it would go and padded each side of the woman’s head with one of those little airliner pillows. That should give the injured woman some support for her back and neck. Moving her could be tricky if she had a spinal injury.

“What is Mags’s status?” Kent’s voice called back to her.

“I would say concussion—probably severe—but the bleeding on the external head wound appears to have stopped. I’ll take a closer look in the near future and suture the cut, if necessary, but that’s about the extent of what I can do without expert diagnostic equipment. If she has a subdural hematoma—a brain bleed—she will need surgery, and I can’t... I’m not...”

Lauren inhaled sharply against a surge of frustration. A subdural hematoma was life-threatening. There certainly was no X-ray machine or other diagnostic equipment around here, much less any surgical tools with which to perform a craniotomy, even if she were qualified to perform one, which a PA-C was not. They needed expert help. Fast!

“Just do your best,” Kent responded. “That’s all any of us can do. Your mom’s right here!”

Kent’s call brought Lauren’s head up. Her mother’s pixie face peeped around her seat, pale but composed.

Mom flapped a hand. “Sorry, dear. I guess I passed out.”

Lauren grabbed for the support of a seatback. Now she could testify it was no cliché that knees did go weak when major relief hit. “It’s okay, Mom. Are you hurt anywhere?”

“Just my pride...I think. Well, no. I’m pretty sure that seat belt gave the old college try at cutting me in half. My tummy hurts, but I’m sure it will pass.”

Lauren didn’t like the sound of that. Mom could have anything from a ruptured spleen to kidney damage. Or maybe just some bruising and tissue abrasions, but that was best-case scenario. And again, there didn’t seem to be any emergency facilities nearby. Perhaps no life at all. She gazed over her shoulder through the shattered windshield and scanned the barren landscape beyond. If that was a town out there, it appeared to be deserted. Hopefully, appearances were deceiving.

She turned toward Kent, who eyed her from the rear of the plane. “Are we going to get people as comfortable as possible here, or could some help be available in that nearby town?”

Garland exhaled a brief chuckle. “I’m fairly certain no one is home in whatever is left of that old mining burg, but I’m going to go check it out. If there’s decent shelter or any kind of supplies, we might move in there until help arrives.”

Voices streamed questions about who might be coming to rescue them and when and how, but the pilot lifted a silencing hand. “All unknowns at this point. I’ll go check out the town while you allow our resident PA to check out your injuries.” He nodded toward Lauren. “The first-aid kit is in the galley.”

“What about your head wound?” Lauren asked. “I should look at that before you go hiking.”

Striding up the aisle toward her, Kent shrugged a shoulder. “Just a nick from flying glass. Look after these fine folks first.” He brushed past her, opened a bin, and pulled out a leather bomber jacket that looked like it had seen better days.

Lauren pressed her lips together. Stubborn macho man. So not her type. Then why did her pulse speed up as he shrugged the coat over broad shoulders?

Frowning, he turned his attention to the main exit behind the cockpit. The door panel looked like an accordion. Fat chance it would open. Lauren’s insides curdled. The way the body of the plane was twisted and bent, how stable was it? Could something give way at any time?

Kent sent her a sidelong look, as if he’d heard her thoughts, and headed back down the aisle. “I’m going to use the emergency exit over the wing.”

With practiced movements, he pulled out the panel and leaned it up against a sidewall.

“One of you fit this back in after I hop out.”

Kent glanced around the cabin, gaze lighting briefly on Lauren. His face was an impassive mask, but in his eyes lurked a grim shadow. Then he hauled himself through the opening.

A chill wind blew through the cabin, and a couple of the executives hopped up and hastily stuffed the door panel back into the opening. The pilot’s disappearance triggered a burst of complaints from the passengers about the cold and demands that Lauren take a look at them immediately. Everyone claimed to have one pitiful condition or another.

“I’ll get to all of you,” Lauren said firmly, “but first I’m going to do a little triage and see who is most critically injured, other than the copilot, who is as comfortable as I can make her at the moment.”

The only executive not trying to whine himself to the head of the line was the elderly one who had finally come fully awake. He gazed around quietly, rubbing the back of his head, and looking thoroughly unhappy.

Her mother smiled and shrugged. “You can see me last, dear. I’m all right.”

The others might be high-powered wheeler-dealers who lived each day on the rush of stock trades and business deals, but actual physical danger or discomfort rendered them dependent children. Sighing, Lauren hunted up the first-aid kit.

What was that pilot not telling them? He had said nothing about contacting the outside world. He sure hadn’t indicated rescue was imminent. His instrument panel was dead. The radio, too. Surely, he’d filed a flight plan before they’d taken off. When the aircraft didn’t arrive at its destination, search parties would look for them. Right? They would be found. Lauren’s gut tightened. But what if they weren’t?

* * *

Insides hollow, Kent stood on the ground and surveyed the remains of his business jet. This narrow valley was sure no landing strip. As soon as he’d hit ground, rocks and potholes and the odd pine sapling that he couldn’t avoid had begun doing things to his plane that never should be done to fine machinery.

He’d slewed once so badly that his left wing gouged the earth, and they’d done a doughnut before finally straightening out. A good chunk of wing tip remained embedded in the ground somewhere along his landing path. And the landing gear was chewed up but good. The forward wheel was missing entirely, and the rear two were in shreds. The twisted body of the plane rested mostly on bare metal struts. Those were only the most obvious structural issues.

His jaw clenched against a sting in the back of his eyes. His jet was less than a year old. A real beaut! His pride and joy. Every nickel he had in the world was tied up in his baby, and now look at her!

Kent cleared his throat and inhaled a deep breath. At least he and his passengers had survived the crazy descent and landing. He should be thanking God, not wallowing in angst. Besides which, he had a mystery to solve. What happened to bring them down in the first place?

“I’d like to be the first to thank you for getting us on the ground safely.”

Lauren’s voice drew his attention, and he lifted his head. She stood framed in the broken window of the cockpit, hugging the first-aid kit to her chest. Kent’s pulse rate skipped into overdrive. She looked vulnerable and tense, but calm and determined and...well, flat gorgeous. Wavy strands of auburn hair had come loose from her thick ponytail and framed a heart-shaped face. The strong chin and elegant, aquiline nose suggested the courage she’d already displayed, but the soft curves of her full mouth and delicately shaped eyebrows lent appealing femininity.

“Earth to Kent.” Her small, teasing smile sent a pleasant shiver down his spine.